


the definition of soulmates

by MiniNephthys



Category: A Hat in Time (Video Game)
Genre: Black Humor, F/M, Light Seal the Deal Spoilers, Past Character Death, Past Relationship(s), Queen Vanessa's Story is a tw all its own tbh, canon-typical child endangerment, this sure is a genre
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-19
Updated: 2019-06-19
Packaged: 2020-05-14 14:00:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 493
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19274773
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MiniNephthys/pseuds/MiniNephthys
Summary: There is not much the Snatcher fears.





	the definition of soulmates

**Author's Note:**

> First fic in the fandom, please be gentle, etc.

_“We all have a soulmate, supposedly. I mean, I know I do. She’s waiting for me.”_

There is not much he could not do with his own power, if he wanted to.

He has minions because doing everything himself is tedious, not because he needs them. Same for his contractors - there’s no reason why he should run around doing this and that when he can get some sucker to do it for him.

(He was a prince once, with servants, he thinks. Or else he was only a man who loved a princess. He can’t be sure.)

There is not much he fears, either. He doesn’t fear that Hat Kid - she’s just too annoying for him to keep dealing with. Even if she is excruciatingly difficult to kill - one of these Death Wishes it’ll finally take - it’s not like she can kill him either.

That manor…

What he remembers is in bits and pieces, most of that life lost to time and torment. He remembers that he was a lawyer, but most of the details of how law is supposed to work when you aren’t a soul-stealing abomination are gone. He had a name once - occasionally a letter or two floats back up (was it A? V?), but never the whole thing, and he’s attached to ‘the Snatcher’ now anyway.

He was a good person, once. It’s not as if he doesn’t know that he wasn’t always down for child murder. But remembering being a good person and actually being one are worlds apart, and he lost the capacity to feel remorse a long time ago.

He remembers _her_ clearest of anything.

It would be easier if he only remembered what she did to make him like this, if he only remembered starving slowly in complete isolation. He thrives on anger and hatred and suffering - preferably other people’s instead of his, but his past self is close to a different person anyway. It would be better if he didn’t remember just as clearly the days when she made him happy. He doesn’t _want_ to know how her smile used to make his heart soar, when he still had a heart to soar.

But if he was that lucky, he probably wouldn’t have died chained to a cellar wall and become a soulless shadow in the first place, so there you go.

That manor. Deep in the black pit where his heart would be if he had one, he knows with complete and unquestionable certainty: if he ever enters that manor, he will never leave it. No matter how powerful he is. No matter how stealthy he is. No matter how unrecognizable he is. She’s still waiting for him, and if she finds him, she will never let him go again.

And that is the only thing in all of space that truly frightens him.

(The one person who makes you feel like no one else can - that’s what a soulmate is, isn’t it?)


End file.
